Analysis: Kansas poised to end K-12 teacher tenure

Brownback must act on the bill before April 26

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Republican Gov. Sam Brownback is all but certain to resist pressure to veto a proposal that would end tenure for public school teachers, approved by the Legislature as part of a court-mandated education funding plan.

Brownback must act on the bill before April 26. Signing the anti-tenure proposal into law could complicate Brownback’s re-election by energizing thousands of angry educators to work against him. He’s avoided public statements about the measure’s merits.

But Brownback, his aides and high-ranking Republican allies in the Legislature already have explained why they believe the measure should become law.

Top GOP legislators argue that the anti-tenure policy isn’t as harsh as it has been portrayed and will help remove bad teachers from classrooms. Brownback and his staff have noted that the measure is part of broader legislation increasing aid to poor school districts, and the whole thing probably would have to be sacrificed to save tenure.

Lawmakers face a July 1 deadline, imposed by the Kansas Supreme Court, which gives them little time to start over.

“We need to continue funding our schools,” Brownback spokeswoman Eileen Hawley said after promising the governor will “take a very careful look” at all the bill’s provisions.

The state Supreme Court ruled in March that past, recession-driven cuts in aid to poor districts created unconstitutional funding gaps between them and wealthier ones. Reversing those cuts will cost $129 million in the 2014-2015 school year, and the plan approved by lawmakers contains the full amount.

GOP conservatives insisted on tying spending to policy changes, including the anti-tenure proposal.

Brownback praised the plan immediately after its passage, pointing to the new dollars for schools. But the Kansas National Education Association, the state’s largest teachers’ union and a vocal critic of the plan, has said the issue isn’t money.

Instead, the KNEA says what is driving its aggressive social media campaign against the measure is “due process.”

Currently, Kansas teachers facing dismissal after at least three years in the classroom can have their cases reviewed by independent administrative hearing officers. Last year, 18 teachers requested the appointment of hearing officers, according to the state Department of Education.

The school funding plan eliminates that right in state law, though any teacher could still seek an administrative hearing if he or she faces dismissal for exercising a right, such as free speech, protected by the state or U.S. constitutions. But with the changes, the KNEA said, administrators won’t be required to tell teachers why they are being fired — and aren’t likely to admit it is because of a political or religious view.

Supporters of the bill pushed back, saying the bill doesn’t prevent local school districts from preserving existing due-process rights in collective bargaining agreements with teachers.

“Honestly, this is a local control bill,” said Senate Vice President Jeff King, an Independence Republican and a lawyer. “The impact of this bill has been greatly overblown.”

Ending tenure was the bill supporters’ intent, and they argue it is a good thing, giving administrators more flexibility in improving their schools.

The KNEA scoffed at the suggestion that the anti-tenure provisions are milder than depicted, and spokesman Marcus Baltzell predicted the changes will promote a “culture of cover-up, harassment and bullying.”

House Minority Leader Paul Davis, a Lawrence Democrat who is challenging Brownback for governor, seized on the issue. Campaign manager Chris Pumpelly said Brownback and his legislative allies faced a simple task, to “fund our schools.”

“They decided to mix in unnecessary, unpopular partisan policies,” he said. “That was a mistake.”

Supporters and critics initially debated whether Brownback could strike the anti-tenure language from the bill with a line-item veto, but the growing consensus among legislative lawyers and the governor’s staff was that he couldn’t.

Thus, to kill the anti-tenure proposal, Brownback would have to veto the entire bill — killing the provisions that satisfy the Supreme Court’s mandate to provide “equity” in funding between poor and wealthier school districts.

Baltzell argues for Brownback to “strike the whole thing” and bring about “a clean funding bill.”

Republican leaders insisted on passing a school funding bill before lawmakers’ annual spring break, which lasts through April 29, arguing that waiting longer risks missing the July 1 deadline. The state’s high court said if lawmakers miss the deadline, part of the state’s funding formula — about $1 billion in school spending — must be put on hold.

“I would not want to do anything to put at risk funding for our schools,” Hawley said.

Thus, Brownback is poised to let the anti-tenure proposal become law, whatever enmity it earns him.

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The bill is slatted to start a fresh start for Kansas taxpayers (NOT THE UNION's). The teachers still have "due process" just not the way it has been for decades. No more taking years to remove a bad teacher. Of course I fully expect the KNEA and the NEA to waste or take more money out of classrooms by suing the State to try and preserve their "PERCEIVED RIGHT" to have lifetime job. Next years bills should only expand on this position so teachers better start applying themselves to the job rather than sux'n up to the NEA....

You're so right! What better way to get the truly talented into a profession then to allow school boards and admin to fire teachers for not giving their children an A, or who would dare to cut them from the cheerleading squad or the basketball team. If this act doesn't do more to get more of the truly talented young teachers into the classrooms to teach our kids then we just as well give up!

He'll just deflect any fallout back on the legislators and act like he really has no choice. Then he'll say, "The people of Kansas have spoken."

This was stuck into the bill at the 11th hour while most of us slept. There was no huge outcry by the people to add this in. It was what the legislators wanted. Another example of representatives that aren't representing the people, just special interests. The people wanted a clean bill.

The bill stinks, I hope election time will put these people where they belong.

I think it was more like the 13th hour they snuck it in. Didn't they used to torture people by depriving them of sleep? Surely the GOP leadership in the legislature wouldn't resort to those types of measures just to try to stick it to somebody.

Many on here love to point all the lying that comes out of D.C. Well, I present to you that it is just not in D.C. that elected representatives of the people will out-right lie. Please check the article from the Wichita Eagle.

Teachers will retire early or leave for states where they can be respected and treated more fairly for their noble profession. We will have a shortage here in no time, and the mass of teachers left will include many who are less qualified, much less experienced, and less committed. A society that lets this happen is a society in rapid decline.

This is the result of ALEC and the Koch brothers and Adelson and several others who have purchased democracy with their money. Billionaires don't care if the masses are poorer, less educated, or have fewer opportunities. They've got theirs and and want to keep it for their own tiny lifetimes and their own little families. By the time the regular guy and gal in Kansas "gets it," it will take generations to repair the damage, if ever. If "we, the people" don't stop listening to these scoundrels and restore the commons and the public domain and public good, and public treasury, we are doomed. That takes revenue. And revenue has to be obtained where it exists. And 40% of it exists in the hands of 0.1% of the population. And they have set up the system to make people believe that asking them to provide the funds needed for the public domain is equivalent to communism. People who believe that hogwash deserve what they get.

"The teachers still have "due process" just not the way it has been for decades. No more taking years to remove a bad teacher."

Point 1. Since schools and teachers will still have due process why the heck do we need to eliminate their tenure to remove a bad teacher?

Point 2. This is one small step towards removing due process and one giant leap towards socialism.

Personal note: Brownback, stay the hell out of the classroom unless you want to come in early, stay late, grade papers, break up fights, clean up vomit, pay for a year’s class supplies out of your own pocket and then get your yearly evaluation from a person that sees you only once or twice a year when something that is totally out of your control blows up in your face. Oh, and one more thing. Being responsible for the future of this nation through our children all without having a pay raise for the past 10 years or more!
No? I didn't think so.